27 February 2010

Hamilton sex trade worker Jennifer Hall was taking a shower in the bathroom when the shooting took place. She testified previously she peered out from the shower curtain to see Jackson holding a gun and trying to force his way into the bathroom.

She said Jackson told the victim "I'm here to rob you, take your money and drugs."

Before Thursday's dinner, Sheikh Nasrallah and President Ahmadinejad discussed "the latest developments in the region, and Zionist threats against Lebanon and Syria", Hezbollah's al-Manar television reported.

"If the Zionist regime decides to repeat its past mistakes, the region will finish it off," al-Manar quoted the Iranian leader as saying.

Both leaders dismissed US calls for Syria to distance itself from Iran, emphasising their "deep and brotherly" ties.

Hmmm... despotic medieval theocracy, radioactive material... and the leader of one of the most despicable terrorist groups in the world... what could possibly go wrong here?

Pieters said the threats to kill Latchana were publicly made in two songs accusing the victim of being a snitch. One song said, "don't let me catch you 'cause those guns will spark ... I will find you after dark, I don't give a fuck man, 'cause the time is soft."

26 February 2010

"At a time of major difficulties in supporting the cost of our health-care systems, [the researchers] have shown that a non-invasive, simple, safe and cheap intervention, possibly done by a paramedic before hospital admission, can significantly increase myocardial salvage."

Libya's Muammar Gaddafi has called for a jihad, or holy war, against Switzerland, as an ongoing diplomatic row between the two nations heats up.

The Libyan leader made his comments while speaking at a meeting to mark the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. "Let us wage jihad against Switzerland, Zionism and foreign aggression."

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RELATED: In other "R.O.P." news...

-- KABUL, Afghanistan -- At least 17 people were killed and 32 wounded early Friday when several suicide bombers attacked a hotel popular with foreigners and the surrounding area in the center of Kabul.

-- KAMLOOPS, B.C. -- A father who was found not criminally responsible for murdering his three children could be granted an absolute discharge if it's determined he doesn't pose a threat to the public, says the chairman of the B.C. Review Board.

...injury AND bullshit... apparently Mr Millions wants Canadian taxpayers to pick up the tab...

The impression Mr. Williams left, that the technique he sought in Miami is not available in Canada, is reinforced by his statement that he will consider applying for reimbursement for his medical costs in Florida.

I guess that's how you get to be a millionaire... by spending other people's money.

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FROM THE COMMENTS:

Yeah. The guy I saw who mortgaged his house and went to Seattle to get gammaknife treatment for his brain tumor will love that.

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PERSONAL NOTE:

Last year, we had to rescue my ailing octogenarian father-in-law and bring him out to live with us. We called the social services people to see if the VON would come out and read his blood sugar... and were told the nurses weren't equipped with, or even allowed to use glucometers.

They did tell us, however...if we weren't willing to subject a sick elderly man to a seven hour wait in the local E.R.... we could call Tele-health Ontario.

"Kandahar means Afghanistan. If we have a peaceful Kandahar, we will have a peaceful Afghanistan," Tooryalai Wesa, governor of Kandahar province, said in an interview. "The history and politics of Afghanistan is always determined from Kandahar."

Yet until recent months, a combat force of only 1,000 Canadian troops was in place to defend Kandahar. That allowed the Taliban to control large parts of the province and reach into the provincial capital with a step-by-step plan to capture Kandahar city.

The troop deployment in Kandahar is being ramped up rapidly and should reach some 6,000 this spring. Thousands more likely would be deployed to begin a major offensive in the province in early summer.

If it's Google Street View infamy you seek, why waste your time with a half-hearted wave to that passing Google car when you could make a real, uh, splash, with some scuba gear and pitchforks?

Two people in Bergen, Norway, are enjoying their five minutes of Internet fame this morning after Street View shots emerged of them ambushing a Google Street View car and chasing after it in full diving gear.

Just make sure you go absolutely screamin' apeshit over the line... and nobody (legally anyway) will hold it against you...

It was a crime so horrendous the judge found he could not be held criminally responsible for his acts, because no reasonable or rationale person could do such a thing.

“I find that Mr. Schoenborn did commit the first-degree murder for each of his children … but is not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder,” Mr. Justice Robert Powers of B.C. Supreme Court ruled.

Of course... all this guy has to do is keep his head down for a few years and make a semblance of being sane... and they'll release him back into the larger field of folk.

I'm sorry... but if you have a mental illness... you should be under the care of a court-appointed guardian, who is legally responsible for your day-to-day life. If your guardian cannot insure that you are complying with medical & legal orders... then they have a responsibility to report that fact.

And the system then has an obligation to intervene, which, yes... includes involuntary custody.

Draconian measures, you say? A mind-boggling expense? Maybe so. But we've seen the results of just standing by and doing nothing.

And, in my humble opinion... it's not worth the life of a single Tim McLean, Hunter Brown or Brian Smith.

22 February 2010

-- OTTAWA -- A teen was shot to death in his west-side home early Monday morning in one of three home invasions to take place overnight. A total of six people are in custody and police were searching for three others.

Paramedics said a 19-year-old man, identified by friends and family as Michael Swan, who lived in Barrhaven until a short time ago, suffered several gunshot wounds in the spacious, two-storey brick home at 4139 Moodie Dr., south of Barnsdale Road, at about 1 a.m.

Police arrested three males from Toronto in connection with the shooting and said charges were pending.

Kristopher Allan McLellan, 20, and 19-year-olds Dylon Tyrone Barnett and Kyle Mullen, are charged in connection with the shooting death of Michael Swan, 19, during a home invasion at a rural Ottawa home early Monday.

An obvious "problem child"spouting extremist views, Hasan made numerous statements that were not protected by the First Amendment and were grounds for discharge by violating his military oath, investigators found.

In searching for explanations for why superiors did not move to revoke Hasan's security clearances or expel him from the Army, the report portrays colleagues and superiors as possibly reluctant to lose one of the Army's few Muslim mental health specialists.

The report concludes that because the Army had attracted only one Muslim psychiatrist in addition to Hasan since 2001, "it is possible some were afraid of losing such diversity" and thus were willing to overlook Hasan's deficiencies as an officer.

For complainants, the process is virtually risk-free. It costs them nothing to file a complaint, and the tribunal mediator will help explain the shakedown. If they want some legal help filing their complaint, they can get it gratis, at the taxpayer-funded Human Rights Legal Support Centre.

And they never have to risk paying costs, no matter how ill-conceived or unjustified their complaint was.

US analysts believe they have identified the Chinese author of the critical programming code used in the alleged state-sponsored hacking attacks on Google and other western companies, making it far harder for the Chinese government to deny involvement.

A separate team of US contractors has traced the launch of the spyware to computers at Shanghai Jiaotong University and Lanxiang Vocational School, according to two people familiar with that inquiry.

The larger question here, of course, is... why do we let them get away with this kind of thing?

21 February 2010

Even media people are seeing through this nonsense, which is not the case when it comes to the saccharine emotionalism of athletes dedicating their achievements to dead relatives.

It's one thing to mark a recent passing of a child or an anniversary of a deceased parent. But now we have -- no joke -- "this ski run is dedicated to my grandfather who died a year-and-a-half ago."

The absolute epitome of this nonsense was when skier Alex Bilodeau was asked... "How much of this gold medal belongs to your brother?"

As Coren astutely notes...

We all have loss and pain in our lives and even disabled people whom we love but we don't broadcast the fact every time there is a camera or microphone in front of us. It becomes an abuse of misfortune and is increasingly hard to take seriously.

This is sport and not Oprah.

And really... what could Bilodeau possibly have said at that media-manipulated fuzzy-bunny moment? Certainly not... "Geez, Brian... I worked my ass off for this... for the better part of a decade... this one belongs to me."

Five teenage boys face murder charges in the week-old beating death of a 20-year-old man in east Toronto. Jin Tao Zhu was found dead inside a home at 1234 Gerrard St. E., near Greenwood Ave., shortly before the noon-hour last Monday, Toronto Police say. The slaying is the city’s eighth murder of 2010.

Charges against the five teens who all live in the Gerrard and Greenwood area — Xiao-Ming Chen, Peng Ren, Zhong-Rong Zheng and Zhao-Hui Chen, all of whom are 18, and a 17-year-old boy — have since been upgraded to second-degree murder, Browne said.

"Catholicism used to be the sort of Church you’re talking about, Tim. I remember one Jesuit prefect of discipline who could have passed for Brian Dennehy’s tougher big brother, if Dennehy had only manned up a bit."

"These days the freaking hymns are in keys straight men and large dogs can’t even hear."richard mcenroe of USfreakingA!Sun 21 Feb 10 (04:12am)

“We have encouraged our third-party transportation providers to be aware of the issues associated with fuels generally, and in the context of our attempts to decrease our own greenhouse gas impacts, we have asked them to lessen their use of fuels which they know would be counter to this goal, where feasible.”

19 February 2010

Since then, he has been linked to 19 mistresses, fined for careless driving, separated from his wife, left professional golf, lost several endorsement contracts and sought treatment for a sexual addiction.

C'mon, buddy... don't be too hard on yourself... who hasn't been caught between the sheets with 19, er... well, shit... I sure hope your wife has a damn good ob/gyn.

And hey, there's nothing like having a strong religious background to light the way, huh?

Mr. Woods said he is turning back to Buddhism, noting he was raised in the religion by his mother.

Yup... that worked out pretty good for ya, didn't it? Heck... nice to know though... you'll always have mummy.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was quoted as saying by Iranian media: "The West's accusations are baseless because our religious beliefs bar us from using such weapons ... We do not believe in atomic weapons and are not seeking that."

Reassuring rhetoric... from the folks who sent waves of children onto bloody battlefields against their Iraqi neighbours.

Now... if you're going to institute multicultural quotas... shouldn't that apply to athletes as well?

-- VANCOUVER -- "I have been chatting with people and I've heard from quite a few people that they, too, feel that it was a spectacular show. And they only wish that they had a bit more portrayal of the multiculturalism in Canada."

-- (CBS/ AP) -- Two sons of high-level Taliban military commander in North Waziristan, Pakistan may have been killed in a suspected U.S. missile attack Thursday, a regional source tells CBS News.

Missile strikes targeting militants have escalated in Pakistan's volatile North and South Waziristan tribal regions since December when a bomber backed by the Pakistani Taliban killed seven CIA employees in Afghanistan.

His B.C. brethren are apparently traipsing along in Premier McSlippery's muddy footprints...

The Liberals' original notion was that EHR would be up and running by the end of 2008. The current target for completion is three years hence, a full five yearsbehind schedule.

They forecast it could be done for $150 million, all but $30 million of which was supposed to come from the federal government.

The capital cost has since grown 50 per cent to a projected $222 million, with the provincial share growing almost fourfold to $110 million. Ottawa is, theoretically, on the hook for the remainder, contingent on the meeting of certain time lines.

"It's something like 2100 pages long, and about 50 jotter books," he writes. "I'd say I worked on and off it for roughly 3 weeks." He set the history lesson to Jacques Offenbach’s opera "Orpheus in the Underworld," music now thought of as the Can-Can.

Looks like the Pakistani intelligence apparatus has finally decided to take its cranium out of a certain bodily orifice...

-- KABUL, Afghanistan -- Two senior Taliban leaders have been arrested in recent days inside Pakistan, officials said Thursday, as American and Pakistani intelligence agents continued to press their offensive against the group’s leadership after the capture of the insurgency’s military commander last month.

The arrests come on the heels of the capture of Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban’s military commander and the deputy to Mullah Mohammed Omar, the movement’s founder.

This could get pretty interesting.

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RELATED: Allah's brave Holy Warriors

Afghan commander Gen Mohiudin Ghori said his soldiers had seen Taliban fighters placing women and children on the roofs of buildings and firing from behind them.

17 February 2010

The letter, which was made available to Reuters by a source familiar with the initiative, is extremely rare because in the past it has mostly been Jewish groups and not Catholic academics who have written to popes about the issue.

The 18 Catholic scholars from United States, Germany and Australia, used the word “implore” twice in the letter, saying that if Pius was made a saint before the historical record is cleared up, it could irreparably harm Catholic-Jewish relations.

Of course, it isn't just Pius who has a bit of a sketchy past.

Benedict, a German who was drafted into the Hitler Youth and German army as a teenager during the Second World War, has had a more difficult relationship with the Jewish community than his predecessor Pope John Paul.

"It has always seemed to me that 'Fucked If I Know' and 'It's All Because of a Giant Invisible Thing Whose Existence Can Neither Be Proved Nor Understood' express precisely the same thought in two different dialects, except ours is simpler."

-- NEW YORK -- U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said the heroin kingpin ordered the executions of a Toronto man on July 20, 1994, sending a hit team and financing it. But the team ended up shooting two innocent people.

Ma had pleaded guilty to two counts of murder on September 20, 2007. His co-defendant, Bing Yi Chen, was sentenced to 35 years in prison on Jan. 4.

Evidence at trial showed that Ma, Chen and their associates engaged in the importation of millions of dollars worth of heroin from Asia into the United States between 1991 and 1996.

Hishammuddin's comments signal that the mostly Muslim country is now prepared to flog Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno, a mother of two, for drinking beer, despite the international criticism that the case has garnered.

Hey, buddy... if pinko rag Huffpo is generating buzz about Dems tossin' your boss under the bus... it might be time to pull up the drawbridge...

"Grim explained that congress is in a "whatever works" mode and incumbents are willing to campaign against the president it if doing so means keeping their seats."

No honour among thieves, huh?

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RELATED: Hope, Change and...

...screw the dumbass greenies...

"Promising 'this is only the beginning,' President Barack Obama on Tuesday announced more than $8-billion (U.S.) in federal loan guarantees for the construction of the first nuclear power plant in the United States in nearly three decades."

“I felt that there was a lack of understanding in how important this institution is,” he said. “I'm leery of vindictive-type responsesfrom the federal government. It was almost like they wanted prove a point based on partisan politics and short-term decision-making.”

Yes... of course.

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FROM THE COMMENTS:

"This is what I have to say to Mr. Lonechild, 'This is the year 2010 AD, people expect accountability. Look on the bright side, if it were 1610 AD and a Chief was stealing from the tribe he'd be stabbed in a variety of unsavory places with a stone knife'."

...the creme de crazee... when even infamous sock-puppet Khurrum Awan decides to take a pass...

Somehow, his brief remarks were among the least controversial at a conference about the "Media War on Islam" on Sunday at a Toronto-area Islamic centre, in which the Christmas Day underwear bomber was described as the tool of an Israeli plot; Barack Obama was referred to as "Mr. Black Man"; al-Qaeda was called "the figment of the imagination of the West"; and a video was shown that mocked 9/11 by putting the Muppet Show logo over slow-motion footage of the second plane's impact, with screams of terror for audio.

And it didn't stop there...

The keynote speaker, given the absences, was Michael Keefer, a professor of literary theory at the University of Guelph, who said that all mainstream news media is "systematically fake" because "news editors have internalized the values of their advertisers."

He described 9/11 as a "planned demolition" run by Americans, and the Toronto 18 bomb plot, which led to convictions and guilty pleas, as a "police frame-up" over "nothing of significance."

15 February 2010

I usually just ignore this sort of thing... as it reinforces everything I have to say about the lunatic left... but it appears as though our potty-mouthed pal has decided to troll around the Blogging Tories salting their comment threads... (as per above)... with insults supposedly authored by me.

It's incredibly transparent & childish... but I suggest anyone on the receiving end of this type of thing email "abuse at blogger.com

14 February 2010

"Colleagues say that the reason Professor Phil Jones has refused Freedom of Information requests is that he may have actually lost the relevant papers."

I'm thinkin'... if it didn't work in Mrs. Smith's fifth grade autocracy... should we really let this one slide?

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RELATED: Get ready for Hurricanegate

Hatton has released what he describes as an 'A-level' statistical analysis, which tests six IPCC statements against raw data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric (NOAA) Administration. He's published all the raw data and invites criticism, but warns he is neither "a warmist nor a denialist", but a scientist.

13 February 2010

It has been a crazy week in Illinois politics, perhaps one of the craziest. The main questions that have been flying around in Democratic circles have been: Who knew what about Democratic Lieutenant Governor nominee Scott Lee Cohen, and when did they know it?

And we're not talking parking tickets here...

When Cohen became a candidate, he disclosed that a 2005 domestic battery charge against him had been dismissed. It was only after his victory Tuesday that the details became known: His girlfriend at the time, a prostitute, had accused him of holding a knife to her throat but had failed to appear in court, leading to charges being dropped.

Please note... that's just one of a myriad of charges.

Of course... the reality is... Cohen was simply playing by "Chicago Rules".

So c'mon, Hannah... we're talkin' about, what..."involuntary luge?"And, in truth, that's all too easy for me to imagine... because that's the only possible way I'd ever find myself on a 23 kilogram (50 lb.) sled travelling 150 kilometers (90 mph) per hour down a freakin' mountain.

The thing is, I've actually broken a ton (100 mph) on a 600 lb. motorcycle... and believe you me... for the non-professional... even that can be a bowel-loosening experience.

Again... this incident is simply about personal responsibility.

I will defend your right to luge, or parachute, or even shoot up heroin... but if, in the process, you turn your cerebral cortex into applesauce... don't be whining about somebody else being responsible.

"It seems that Olympic Games deaths, while uncommon, are more likely to occur during Winter Games. In fact in 1964, the very first year that the luge was admitted as an official Olympic sport, it suffered its first fatality, the death of Polish luger Kazimierz Kay-Skrzypecki."

FIL and VANOC officials announced the men would begin racing from the lower women's start and that the wall where Kumaritashvili crashed after flying off the track at a speed of close to 144 kilometres per hour would be raised. The ice profile was also altered so the athletes and their sleds would be pushed to the middle of the track.

There's no admission of wrong-doing here... but with a dead athlete, I guess they have to pump the brakes.

"In terms of track access, we lived up to (FIL) observations and surpassed them. We offered additional training for smaller nations on Jan. 1," he said. "The number of runs was agreed upon by the National federations. From a safety perspective, we felt confident we got the right number of runs for the teams."

Two months ago, FIL officials said future sliding tracks should limit speeds to 137 kmh. Whistler has been sending athletes down its icy pitch at a speed of 155 kmh. Romstad said there have been 5,000 runs held here over the last two years and the "crash ratio" remains low at 3 per cent

So, raise the wall in this one corner? That sounds like a good idea.

But... on the day the event opens... they're gonna alter the profile of the track everybody has been practising on? That sounds like a potential safety hazard.

Two final observations here.

There's a woman's starting line? Isn't that sexist & condescending?

Two... would it have really mattered if Nodar Kumaritashvili had been going 137 kph instead of 144?

-- TORONTO -- The Crown alleges that J.W. dragged the 15-year-old victim down the stairs, after which C.D. rifled his pockets to remove some items before they fled.

Malcolm told defence lawyer Lydia Riva that when he arrived at around 2:20 p.m. to see the Grade 9 student lying on his stomach at the foot of the stairs, he noticed three girls standing nearby, looking nonchalant.

"One time I saw David wearing earphones while typing on his laptop. The screen was divided into four windows: one for Word, one for MSN messenger, and two different YouTube videos (one was a song that he had playing through the headphones, and the other was 'How to build a paper hang glider'.")

"And the dog was sleeping on his lap."

Earlier this year, after establishing a few ground rules, we allowed 13 year-old Neophyte to open up a Facebook account. I was astonished at how quickly he was buried under a pile of friend requests.

It seems today's teens & tweens have absolutely no reluctance to embrace all that technology has to offer. It's a little bit of a shock... this is a kid whose favourite baby toy was a curly piece of telephone cord.

And it isn't just computers... Techno-boy been converting his favourite YouTube videos to little operettas that constantly throb & hum on his Ipod-o-sauraus... a smallish, infernal contraption that for all intents & purposes, might as well be surgically implanted in the base of his skull.

My latest discovery is that, apparently, we are the Luddite parents in his circle of friends... he's now campaigning for a cellphone.

So much for the simple days of a boy and his dog.

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FROM THE COMMENTS:

"I don't consider myself a Luddite, just a guy who has seen it all before; being able to read a blog while camping in Algonquin Park doesn't wow me. It makes me sad."

"Of course, I was up until 3 am this morning googling how to use a certain brush technique for Paint Shop Pro, downloading some pics from Project Gutenberg to merge for some "art", while listening to first the Sabres game, then a ripped CD that I was loading onto my iPod."

11 February 2010

The Sunday Times newspaper reported last month that Colin Gunn — a gangland boss convicted of conspiring to murder a couple in 2004 — warned on Facebook that "I will be home one day and I can't wait to look into certain people's eyes and see the fear of me being there."

In other cases, escaped convicts have used Facebook to taunt the police. British burglar Craig "Lazie" Lynch became an Internet celebrity after he posted mocking messages and defiant photos on Facebook during four months on the run from a minimum security prison.

"What we must fight for is to safeguard the existence and reproduction of our race and our people, the sustenance of our children and the purity of our blood, the freedom and independence of the fatherland, so that our people may mature for the fulfillment of the mission allotted it by the creator of the universe."

- Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf) -

are indeed condemned to repeat it...

"We need to make sure we are distinct since everything we have and do on the reserve is determined by our biology."

-- BARRIE -- Paul Bradey, 45, of Midland, was found guilty of the first-degree murder of Cousineau, 23, a mentally challenged woman with the maturity of a 13-year-old. He was also found guilty of arson and committing an indignity to a human body.

Over the past two months the jury listened to the horrific details of how Bradey trapped Cousineau in the basement and burned her naked body with a blowtorch, then left her for two days to slowly die Nov. 13, 2007.

Good gawd.

And... wait for it... the compassionate, intellectual... and, so patriotic left responds...Wow... I got nuthin'.

"I've been musing for years on how the illusions of multicultural tolerance have been hijacked by the avowedly unicultural and intolerant, but you could hardly have a more parodic example than Omar Hassan."

10 February 2010

-- Q: Just how long does it take for a man to obliterate every notion of what he stands for?

-- A: At least 24 hours... I hear the paperwork is incredible

"I do not customarily offer advice to a president whose election I opposed, whose goals I fear, and whose policies I work against. But here is an idea for Barack Obama to salvage his tottering administration by taking a step that protects the United States and its allies."

"Obama can give orders for the U.S. military to destroy the Iranian nuclear weapon capacity."

What the hell... let's get 'er done before the mothership shows up to collect him.